aries full moon

Sep 28

What’s the story, Morning Glory?

calling it in, to clear it out

“***Goldenrod*** is strong, tall and bright. Her flower essence offers the gift of being able to stay true to oneself when you are in groups or are around other personalities who may be strong and willful. Her beautiful flower will sweep away intrusions and also offer a bright light for the journey of your heart. She will aid you to feel secure and assist you to stay focused on your path. She also offers inspiration by her example. She says, “Stand tall. You are more than enough.”

As the fall equinox arrives in the northern hemisphere, sun-rays diffuse at the tilt of the Earth and I’ve been thinking about things that change slowly… right before a sudden immediate shift. Methodical, measured, and attuned to both worlds of light & shadow, seen & unseen, and then… boom! The build up to a transition moment often feels pressurized. We can often sense the shifts just before they arrive when we’re thinking less & perceiving more. How the act of creating change doesn’t necessarily happen because of our will or determination alone. It sometimes happens by accepting the invitation to collaborate with circumstance and build energy & momentum. Sheer force applies within context, & this time of year it’s a focus towards tending the embers & sparks that fuel the flame as the light wanes. We draw our energy back into the ecology of whom and where we belong, like deciduous trees preserving nutrients while the Sun slips farther from reaching branches. Watching wind carry softened amber leaves across a cool southern sky… I notice how the past two weeks have signaled the change even while most trees are still holding their green amongst the few crisp & tan leaves in the wind. Tangled parchment in the periwinkle rosemary blooms, acorns popping on the deck as we drink the solar light before the cold sinks in.

Libra is a polarizing sign. On one hand, the dynamic air sign of diplomacy, justice & relationship seeks to harmonize. On the other, libra knows that to strike a balance we must often move things around, and as the exaltation place of Saturn, it could be said that refusal is the first step towards refinement & elegance & order. Sometimes that means clearing away what doesn’t fit, rearranging the order of things until it has that ‘je ne sais quoi’. Often, this kind of balancing act requires the ability to see the whole picture, and finesse accordingly. While Mars continues to sojourn through this sign (in fall), and the Sun is in detriment here, it could be suggested that in order to know what to remove we have to step back a bit, and see things from another angle, through a different lens, so that perspective can guide efficiency. Truly beautiful moments are often orchestrated amongst upheaval. Change itself reveals decay, and Libra arranges itself in opposition in order to create dramatic contrast & bring attention to the unseen potential awaiting to be revealed amongst transitional times.

So… what are you refusing? As the pieces of your life shift into new shapes, picture frames get moved slightly to the left, a new book charms the coffee table… where are you meeting resistance that may require your refusal or acceptance in order to open towards a more beautiful thing. This is reciprocity, the dance which gives permission for action to take place from the vantage point of honorable & thoughtful intention (or, you know… a hell no, and then as the saying goes… all is fair in love and war).

Available now is a bright and brilliant shift. We often dance around limitation, taking a stance as if we could ever be certain of what is right or wrong, beautiful or lackluster, acceptable or clearly not it. It can never be measured by our perception alone, and yet perception is what allows us to create value. That is what libra season requires of us. In order to see clearly, we must have a point of reference, we must perceive beyond the regular senses, in hopes of landing on a justified choice. In the process, we make meaning through juxtaposition. Noticing the people, places, and things which seem to strike a cord of our own harmonic, and of equal importance, find the things that simply aren’t the vibe. Knowing that realizing what doesn’t work has value, too.

From this years Virgo New Moon, to the Aries Full Moon, is a strange shuffle. Asking one to edit, organize, & analyze all the details & meaning of the material amongst you & then possibly strike a match and let the sparks consume the whole damn thing. It’s a sudden initiation, a fresh turn. As if between the New & Full Moon this cycle, we may have realized that there are some things which simply aren’t worth the effort or energy, taxing the way we progress, hindering our ability to create atmosphere for beauty to emerge. We may also be aware of the things which we would like to carry through this transition, aspiring to build bridges into the next experience as the vision of a beautiful dream emerges.

Walking between worlds, what will you leave amongst the leaves as they pile to feed bonfires & compost? What will you toss to the flames to turn to ash, to the soil to slowly return to fertile ground? & What will you bring with you? What totems do you carry like a badge of honor, the things you wish to cary forth into next phase? Beauty is not so simple as a surface level experience, beauty can be a resource. Beautiful things, people, and places can inspire revolution and evoke passionate truths. Beauty is not just a tool for manipulation or a mask of glamour. It beckons one to a doorway, the skin of a threshold, an access point for those willing to look beyond the shimmering veil, and see beyond the mimicry of ideals & into the depth of what makes one come alive in the face of undeniable resonance to the natural expression which matches inner & outer worlds… aka… infallible & flawless. Identity & authenticity are not inherently the same thing. Seeing & believing are not inherently the same thing. There is a place within that only opens to truth. It is a sound that only you can hear, but once you embody it, others can see. It is available to you at all times, and it is the only way to become beautiful, inside & out.

It’s sweet, and subtle, and soothing to imagine making clean breaks off the branches which no longer bend towards the light. Fresh starts are possible now. Let things glow amongst the palate of your choosing, make choices, make sure they’re for the reasons which build truth and integrity, which is the tone of beauty at its core. intrinsic truth from the central source of the inner flame, beaming outwards in radiant luminosity. As a collective, we are in a moment where the pendulum has shifted, and as things quicken, we must learn to trust our inner guidance, our authentic & complex, undefinable unique expression. (hello, to the third and final Uranus/Venus square riding shotgun with this full moon energy.) Breakthrough, or bust.

The posibility that aesthetics inform the inner realms, reflects inner truths, creates atmospheres for those meaningful moments to occur within is not just a nice idea. It’s something we see in nature. Plants that provide nutrients for certain parts of the body are often shaped like those body parts. Flowers that offer gentle emotional support often have petals which poetically reflect their wishes to lift you into wholeness. It’s all there, for you to see, if you’re willing to look. If you’re willing to actually see what you’re being shown.

Most people don’t want to see, because they are afraid of what fantasies will have to die. Because those breadcrumbs have enable laziness, sustained them thus far, and their lack of self reflection has blinded them to their own desires. It is a symptom of fear in a culture which does not value death. A culture entrapped by their own refusal to claim their own power, and understand the responsibility of that power. A culture that has been stripped of the tools necessary to navigate power and right relationship to self & other. A culture that says… don’t look at the light within, give your time and energy to others, and take it from others without asking when you’re depleted. Here… look at a screen instead, have a drink, and numb your senses, let images & other peoples projections create a false idea of hope that you’ll never live up to, and spend your whole life trying to become something that you can never be while you run from your own potential. Some will never see beyond that loop. Others, learn to value their voice, and choose a narrow path regardless of where it leads, because they have the boldness to simply be exactly who they are. A strange paradox for strange times, to be brave for simply being yourself.

Fall is the time of magic, transformation, and clarity. We begin to feel lighter, see through the branches, the sun looses strength, and the nights grow longer. We know, within some ancient part of us, that these darkened days comfort & revitalize the aching dull heat of late summer. The visibility of the Sun’s gaze softening as the temperatures drop and we slow down. We make arrangements. We tend to the plans on the horizon, and we prepare the medicines and meetings and dinner parties and delicacies of what must preserve through the thinning light. We get cozy. We feel the sun begin to sink in our bones, storing warmth for winter months. We, too, change.

Before the limbs go bare, liminal space suspends those fleeting glimpses of a world in-between. Good bones are an essential part of creating something that can withstand the patina of time, and we savor the things that feel strong enough to lean on. Good bones are the wisdom of what has come before being capable of supporting the shake up of change. In the season of the Sun’s waning light, we lean into loved ones, soft sweaters, and stirring pots, and final garden harvests. We gather what matters most for the slow turn into the end of the year.

May your life find balance amongst the structures which still stand firm, holding the lightness of your being as the fleeting moments lift your gaze toward glimpses of the gifts your efforts have built thus far. Celebrate, sink deeply into the embrace, and know there is no where else to be but right here, fully, presently, accountably, you.

Fall gently, and by that graceful dance, let it all fall into place.

see me as a ticket to foreign lands, I’m the pathway

This full moon links up with the Aries Solar Eclipse April 20, earlier this year. The first break off the nodal axis from the Scorpio & Taurus series that has haunted us (or was it just me, ha!) since November 2021. The dragon’s head spins us towards the next series of Venus/Mars ruled signs, this time, with a focus on mars as the ruler of the north node. Meanwhile, Venus (ruling Mars, still transiting through Leo) squares off with Uranus, providing plot twists from the final gasp of a Venus/Uranus story which unfolded along side the Venus retrograde this summer. So, let the messages show you what you need to know, awakening any upheaval within you to be accounted for as we gear up for a new nodal story.

We’re getting the first glimpse of where we must make new paths in order to balance the things that have circulated along the Aries and Libra axis. It’s a masculine shift, one along the yang/solar polarity, one which questions reciprocity, relationship, values, authenticity, and action. The previous eclipse series through Taurus & Scorpio taught us the bracing depth of feminine power & transformational purification of what that power asks of us (with the final eclipse of that series happening one month from now). We come up from water & earth, breathing fire & air.

The head of the dragon is in Aries, blazing new trails into risky territory... risky because it’s beyond where we’ve been before. Can we pioneer without pillaging? Where have we enabled unhealthy behaviors, attachments, relationships with self & other? Who & what must be cut off from your energy, where are you feeling a recoiling from things that once could have made you feel safe, comfortable, connected, accepted by social ideals or projected desires. This could be experiences outside of yourself, or a deep look at the inner realms of your own relationship with personal power.

Time to find what you’re willing to fight for, and this Full Moon gives a glimpse, a scroll is dropped before you and as it unfurls, a tool is provided. We’re given just enough to inspire action… but not enough to satisfy the insatiable hunger of the north node’s quest… not yet, at least. It’s a slow burn. Instinct over impulse is the key for this transformation. Note the themes that link between April 20 & the Full Moon on September 29. Find the truth that feels childlike, dazzling, the one that feels like seeing something for the first time, seeing something that you want for the first time. That is the wisdom that Aries holds. It is in those moments of brazen instinct which surges forth from the spark within where we learn what we are willing to do in order to protect the virtues of life, in a world which beckons us to make new choices, and build new worlds, and possibly burn old bridges. This is the last full moon in aries we will have before the eclipses start rolling out the tides of fate, so notice what shows up, and trust your first impressions. It could be a spark that guides you through the next few years. There’s only one way to find out.